


The Man With All The Teeth

by Deathstar510



Series: Worlds Apart, Brought Together [4]
Category: Vikings (TV)
Genre: Athelstan-centric, Gen, Non-Graphic Rape/Non-Con, The teeth monster he sees in Wessex haunts my dreams and this is the result
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-13
Updated: 2021-01-13
Packaged: 2021-03-17 18:13:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 555
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28729449
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deathstar510/pseuds/Deathstar510
Summary: All those times Athelstan had prayed, God had never answered him, but Wessex was the first time he felt so thoroughly that God had abandoned him.
Series: Worlds Apart, Brought Together [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2096247
Comments: 4
Kudos: 7





	The Man With All The Teeth

**Author's Note:**

> Just a horrid dark little ficlet brought to you by my remembering how much I deeply want to fight Ecbert. I just want to fight him. It is fairly non-graphic but please mind the warnings.

On the journey to Kattegat, cold and afraid and thoughts soaked in the blood and screams of his dead brothers, Athelstan had begged God for salvation. Months later, when Ragnar Lothbrok returned to England with his raiding party and left him alone to care for the children, knowing he would never be a man to abandon them and run, Athelstan had begged God for a sign. Then, alone at Uppsala, saved from sacrifice by the last shreds of his faltering faith but still at the mercy of his own bleeding, guilty heart, he begged God for answers. Three times he begged, with everything he was, for God’s grace and three times he received only silence.

Kneeling now on the floor in Wessex, body aching from bruises and scalp scabbed and pain screaming through every pierced and brutalized limb, he begged God once more for the Holy Spirit to guide him, to fill him, to _ravish him_.

And in answer, God sent him a devil. A devil with a dark heart and darker intent and bright, bright teeth that gleamed razor sharp at the edges of his vision. It knocked away the crutch that gave him the limited, painful mobility that he’d been able to maintain, it lured him to the bed, and it stole away his breath with terror and blood and that great, bladed mouth that opened itself to swallow him whole.

God had been silent for so long, but never did Athelstan feel his absence as achingly clear as when he woke the next morning, tears on his face and an empty loss in his heart and the sun shining in through the cracks around the door. His bedding lay littered on the floor, illuminated by the thin beams of light, and he made no move to retrieve them. His body ached too much, screamed, new agony layered onto the old, and not knowing what else he could do, he laid back on the bare bed, closed his eyes, and tried not to think of harsh hands and painful, monstrous bites.

He tried, he tried, he failed, and when he finally pulled himself from bed after hours of laying awake it was all he could do to pull his robes on and force himself to crawl across the floor to his discarded crutch. King Ecbert had never explicitly demanded that he come to him in the villa, but a king forced to make his orders explicit was a king displeased, and Athelstan had no doubt that he would regret displeasing a man such as Ecbert.

Though, with men such as Ecbert, pleasing them could destroy him just as thoroughly.

Athelstan struggled inside and each step felt like a brutal penance extracted for a crime he never committed. His body shook, his eyes closed, and while he stood there at the door and sucked in painful gasps of air that strained his bruised ribs, a hand fell onto his shoulder.

It squeezed. The ache of bite marks left behind on his skin flared up like they’d been branded into him. When he opened his eyes, it was Ecbert standing beside him, his hand on his shoulder, and his voice low and oh so falsely gentle as he offered to help him the rest of the way.

He smiled, and all Athelstan saw was teeth.


End file.
